[rhysdad]

I'm keen on natures free bounty. I now have a wild cherry tree that's unpicked each year all to myself and have unlimited supplies of damsons, sloes, apples etc.

I'd love to find more freebies to harvest but haven't the faintest idea of where to find all these delicious plants!

The other thing i am curious about is picking fruit near to roads. I happened upon a fully laden conference pear tree, completely wild, but it's about 30/35m away from the Main A20, up an embankment and along a flat piece of waste ground. I'm wondering how car exhaust will affect produce near to it...

Any pointers???

[sunshineband]

If you do pick anything from near a road, you would of course wash it thoroughly I'm sure 

The pear tree seems a fair way from the traffic ......

[DD.]

We used to pick fruit from the side of the road when there was lead in petrol. Never did me any harm.         

[GrannieAnnie]

And if its up an embankment, surely any car fumes would be heavy and stay near the ground!

[ex-cavator]

I think its highly unlikely you'll be eating sufficient produce from the roadsides to do you any harm. I've just come back from a long walk with my lad, a track / bridleway took us past a run down manor estate, and was lined with wild raspberry bushes and neglected cherry trees. Absolutely delicious. I can see us walking that way again  

[nuttytart]

rhysdad, if you go onto amazon and look for a book called food for free, there's numerous books that come up and tell you where to look for 'free food' many have picturesfor easy identification. It always comes out with us on walks!!!

[Mosslane]

I so look forward to autumn. We have so much in the hedgerows around our place. Blackberries, sloes, loads of hawes this year, elderberries, rosehips all which can be used for jams, jellies and syrups. Also found our cob nut tree is loaded this year and the damson have set good fruit again. Going to try a wonderful recipe I discovered for Cobnut and damson mincemeat. The only thing I watch is that we don't pick blackberries too low down as a number of dogs get walked up the lane

[scabs]

Food For Free is the bible, but for easy and fast identification, you can't go far wrong with the Collins Guide to Wild Food.

Happy hunting! 

[savbo]

Is that the same as the lovely Roger Philips book Wild Food? a real coffee-table look but good recipes and sensible comments

M

[sloegin]

the sas survival book is fantastic to use for foraging

[sunshineband]

the sas survival book is fantastic to use for foraging

and great if you get stuck out all night too I would think 

[Madame Cholet]

Hedgerow jam is one of my fave flavours.

[sloegin]

the sas survival book is fantastic to use for foraging

and great if you get stuck out all night too I would think 

Seriously i loved that book my brother got it yrs ago i used to bring it to bed to read!